


Steam

by HungryLibrary



Category: RWBY
Genre: F/F, First posted to Tumblr, and the girl who still thinks they can change it, frustration and comfort, listening ruby, the girl who hates everything wrong in the world, venting blake
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-31
Updated: 2014-12-31
Packaged: 2018-03-04 12:52:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3068627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HungryLibrary/pseuds/HungryLibrary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Blake had thought, after things settled down again, that the blow up with Weiss would have taken some of the pressure off her chest.</p>
<p>The day long argument, the yelling, the reconciliation that followed… Months of held back remarks pouring out over a single weekend. She’d assumed keeping quiet would be easier afterwards, at least for a while.</p>
<p>Turns out it was the exact opposite.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Steam

“Um, Blake? You’re doing that scowling thing again… it’s kinda scary.”

Ruby sounded more worried than scared. A touch of guilt mixed with the burning in Blake’s gut as she did her best to smooth out the grim lines of her face.

Controlling her features had never been this hard before…

“Sorry.” She muttered, yanking her eyes away from the laughing boy, Cardin Winchester, who was a thousand times worse than Weiss had ever been.

She didn’t look up from her books again, but Blake could still feel Ruby’s eyes on her for the rest of the meal.

When the last plate was cleared and Blake slipped off without another word, she again felt Ruby’s gaze. And she heard Ruby’s quiet ‘catch you guys later’ as the younger girl excused herself to follow Blake in the direction of the library.

It would have been easy to give Ruby the slip.

But the same silence that had once kept Blake safe now just felt suffocating. Maybe a  moment with a friendly ear would help sort everything out.

-

“It’s like that _everywhere_ , and no one even seems to notice!”

Blake strides furiously up and down the history section, pacing even though she never paces and putting all her remaining restraint into keeping her voice to an angry hiss.

“There are shops that won’t serve Faunus customers, or charge extra, or only let you in the backrooms- But whenever someone complains, they’re just brushed off as trouble makers or attention-seeking discontents. Even other Faunus start avoiding them!”

Up and down she marches, passing by Ruby with every lap.

The burnet stands with her head bowed and her hands pressed between her back and the hard wood of the shelf. Only silver eyes moving as she soaks up every word of Blake’s rant.

It’s been going on for almost ten minutes, still the Faunus just can’t get herself to stop.

“Put a human and a Faunus in the same job at the same company and two out of three times, the human will be paid more for _the same work_.”

Blake is nearly growling now. Her fingers flex into fists, frustrated at the illogical unfairness of it all in way that she hasn’t been in years.

Ruby stays quiet.

Her attention is almost palpable to Blake, though, like a padded wall absorbing her thoughts instead of just bouncing them back at her as echoes.

“Some doctors refuse to treat us because they supposedly don’t know enough about our physiology and don’t want to get sued for malpractice- Never mind that they are each _supposed_ to take a class on Faunus care before earning their license…”

Footsteps slowing, Blake feels herself gradually winding down.

“It’s just-“ She stops with her back to Ruby, facing a dead-end wall covered in books written by wonderful, almost entirely _human_ authors.

“-it wasn’t doing any good. Speaking up as individuals didn’t get us anywhere, so we thought, maybe as a group we could force people to listen.”

There’s a swish of cloth as Ruby moves, a shift in the air as she steps up behind Blake, close enough to touch.

“I never knew.”

Warm fingers press into the back of Blake’s clenched fist- a tentative little gesture to match the soft shame in Ruby’s voice.

“Not all of it, I mean… That you were still being hurt, that it wasn’t just a few all-round nasty people here and there doing stuff like this to you guys.”

“That’s always how it goes.” Blake says it with a laugh that sounds dead even in her own ears.

“The good people don’t even think about it in the first place, and the bad just assume everything thinks like them. Pretty hopeless, really…”

“I don’t think so.”

A little shock runs through Blake as Ruby firms her grip, somehow covering the Faunus’s larger hand with her own.

Turing to glance at the brunet, Blake sees a familiar small smile on her friend’s lips.

“Like I said before, that’s why we’re here, remember? To make it better.”

A crooked quirk hooks one corner of Blake’s mouth. Sometimes looking at Ruby is like looking at a window into her past, back when the world was a brighter place.

“I thought you were talking about Grimm that night.”

“I was.” Ruby nodded, smiling a bit wider as Blake’s expression softened. “But now I know there are more monsters out there for us to deal with, and I know that because of _you_.”

She gave Blake’s hand an encouraging squeeze, immediately slipping their fingers together as Blake’s fist finally relaxed.

“Same with Yang and Weiss, and Jaune and the others. You’ve already proved a lot of people wrong by coming here to Beacon- Now we’re here to help with the rest. Okay?”

It was an idealistic sort of thing to say. Just like on that first night, Blake felt the urge to warn Ruby away, pop her little bubble innocence before it carried her too high above the unforgiving ground…

Just like on that first night, she found herself smiling a little instead.

“… Okay.”


End file.
